


I'll Be Your Home

by inpiniteu



Category: NU'EST
Genre: Canon Compliant, Comfort, M/M, predebut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-26
Updated: 2020-01-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 04:46:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 794
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22421290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inpiniteu/pseuds/inpiniteu
Summary: So, at the age of fifteen, Minki builds a home for himself in the smiles and soft eyes of Kwak Aaron.
Relationships: Aaron Kwak | Aron/Choi Minki | Ren
Comments: 5
Kudos: 43





	I'll Be Your Home

**Author's Note:**

> This the longer version of a Twitter drabble I wrote and also my first time writing both of them and together. I hope it's an enjoyable read for you and thank you for reading/giving this a try! :)

Minki has often heard that fifteen year old shouldn’t have worries or concerns, that they're too young to even grasp what concerns truly are.

They shouldn’t, indeed, but being a teenager doesn’t stop him from having them, those concerns and worries that plague his mind. 

He has many of them, thoughts that follow him everywhere he goes and wake him up in the middle of the night.

He could be special. Special, because he’s not a boy in middle school that only has to think of homework and whether he’ll be allowed to hang out with his friends if hagwon doesn’t end too late. 

Choi Minki is more than that, and his concerns are on a different, bigger scale.

Then again, he could also and simply be weird because while he’s a trainee in Seoul, away from the place he’s called home for so many years, so are Jonghyun, Dongho, Minhyun, and Aaron. 

They are just like him and yet, he’s never heard them say anything about how hard it can get or how wrong it sometimes feels.

It wouldn't be surprising to him that he's a bit of both in the end, special _and_ weird. Being weird isn't necessarily a bad thing, and for him, just underlines he's different from everyone else. 

Different, out of ordinary, all of those things—they make him who he is, they make him special, they give him strength and motivation.

He's fifteen, only fifteen, and that's perhaps why he's able to believe so easily, so strongly that the world is out for him, for them, all five of them, to take. 

They're going to be successful, one day or another, one way or another. Still, while he does not doubt that the path he’s taken is the one that was made for him, it doesn’t mean it’s easy.

It isn’t, and sometimes, he wants to talk about it. He needs to, even. 

He wants to, so bad, but Jonghyun already has enough on his plate, pressured by being Pledis’ first male trainee and the expectations that come with that title.

Dongho is a whole world away at times, mysterious and out of reach and Minhyun, well, Minhyun is comfortable and the one who could, should relate to him the most.

After all, they’re the youngest of their team, and they share the same memories of the food stalls and the streets of Busan.

Still, there’s something about Minhyun that is unsettling, Minki thinks. Unsettling in the way Minhyun works so hard to get rid of his satoori and how easy it seems for him to embrace his new identity. He's doing way better than Minki has been able to so far.

It isn’t a bad thing, of course it isn’t, and Minki isn't envious. It's not Minhyun's fault that Minki finds it difficult to deal with this new persona he's been given, that he has trouble finding out where the line between Choi Ren and Choi Minki needs to be drawn. It's not Minhyun's fault that he doesn’t long for home the way Minki does.

Minki is sure, though, that Minhyun wouldn't understand what goes through his mind. He would still try, though, because Minhyun is like that, eager to help and please, but Minki has no intention to share his burdens with him.

Sharing burdens with someone should only be done if both parties can gain a newfound strength from it. There's no point in doing so if it will only bring people down with unsolicited worries or heavy thoughts. Minhyun is soaring too high for that already.

It's only pure luck that Minki soon discovers that there’s someone who understands him. Someone he didn't even consider. 

Indeed, there's someone who can understand that despite being strong, holding strong and being set about your future, you can also long for home.

There's Aaron, who despite being older than them, doesn’t know, doesn’t care enough about Korean customs and gives hugs too easily. Aaron, who makes phone calls locked in the bathroom late at night when he thinks no one can hear him, and always finishes with whispers of “ _I miss you, mom_ “ that brought tears to Minki’s eyes more than once.

They’re different in so many ways but yet the same, Minki thinks. Not the same people but looking for the same things.

So yes, Aaron, with his silences that speak volumes and his comforting smiles, becomes the home Minki finds for himself.

More than missing Busan and his family, Minki just wanted to build a home away from home, wanted to have a place to come back to.

So, at the age of fifteen, he learns how to do that and builds a home for himself in the smiles and soft eyes of Kwak Aaron.


End file.
